


Under Her Touch (All Of Me Shudders)

by Iamasortofvillain



Category: The Last of Us (Video Games)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Lesbian Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Sex, Light Angst, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Sexual Content, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, dina is a perfect badass angel, ellie is a dumbass
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:28:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26564380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iamasortofvillain/pseuds/Iamasortofvillain
Summary: Make my messes matter, make this chaos countOr:Five times Ellie and Dina had to run for their lives + one time they didn't
Relationships: Dina & Ellie (The Last of Us), Dina/Ellie (The Last of Us)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 89





	1. Don't Kiss Me If You're Afraid Of Thunder (My Life Is A Storm)

**Author's Note:**

> I kissed her until there was more happiness inside me than sadness

Your heart is beating in your chest so hard you can hardly breathe, hardly think, hardly see.

There is a low thump from the inside of the dark apartment and the spreading of the familiar (hateful horrible) stench of the infected. A slight sour smell of old sweat, dust, and the undertone of copper from dried blood and you're choking you're choking you're choking.

Next to you, Dina is taking a deep breath and swallowing a cough. Unlike the house and unlike the infected and ulinke you, Dina has a nice smell of sweet flowers and worn out leather and smokey wood and home. She is a hot hot hot hot presence next to you, her breaths rapid and shallow, eyes fixed on the shadows and it's very very hard not to touch her.

She is radiant, spreading heat like an open oven (like a flame) and you're having trouble focusing on the task at hand, even with the infected closing in on you and the lingering smell of death around you.

"Up ahead," Dina whispers a warning and you need to stop looking at her but you can't.

(The mortal danger and the inky darkness and the unnerving scratches of the infected from deep inside the building has nothing on your ever building lust and it takes everything you have not to pull Dina into a kiss).

(You stay planted in your place, crunched and unmoving and silent, sweat streaming down your face, lungs burning, and you swallow your inappropriate urges and try to focus on a way to stay alive).

(Dina is smiling at you).

Then there is a hollow feeling in your guts, like at a fall from a great height, and half a dozen infected roar and scream and clatter from the dark apartment. Your head snaps back, your eyes searching for close threats, and everything that isn't mortal dread (and a building need to run run run) is forgotten.

(Somewhere far off, water is rushing in a roar and it makes your stomach drop. The thought makes you scratch your arms nervously. Water, and from the sound of it – a massive body of water. The tug at your guts becomes a sickening fear and you swallow the bile rising in your throat).

"Hey".

Dina, level headed and level hearted and solid and brave, clutches your fingers with a cold hand. She still isn't looking at you but when she speaks, her voice is low and committed. You are damp with cold sweat and your flesh creeping.

"You doing okay?" Now she is staring at you with hot (dark dark) eyes, her head dropped to one side, and a hint of a smile in her voice. It's a lovely kind of smile, the kind that makes your heart brave. The kind that makes you want to keep her safe. (The kind that makes you want to kiss her).

"Yeah." You breathe out and it's not a lie (it's not a lie).

It's hot as an oven and noisy as a slaughterhouse and dark as a pit of a well and you wonder if you didn't make a grave mistake, coming in here. (You remind yourself didn't have a choice. The street is a raging river and the roofs are broken and unstable and rotten and you had to find a way to cross this part of the city, to make some distance between your and the WLF soldiers. Your only option was this route and you wish you had just turned back but it's a stupid wish so you get rid of it and tell yourself to focus on what's ahead).

(Ahead is a threat you cannot control and cannot disarm easily and cannot slip by, so you clutch Dina's hand and look around you, searching for a solution).

"There." You say and guide Dina's hand to your shoulder, press her fingers to let her know you want her to keep her hand on you while you start your slow journey away from the entry to the trashed living-room.

You move slowly, with Dina's hand on you as to not lose each other in the dark. Your flashlight is acting up and you give it a little shake, just a small one, to prevent it from turning off. (You make a mental note to look for batteries while you're in there if you don't die).

"You think we can make it?" Dina whispers and you shake your head.

(No).

"What, then?"

"We'll find another way." You whisper through gritted teeth as you put one foot in front of the other, going slowly sideways, putting some necessary distance between you and the inhabitants of the dark apartment.

What you thought must be six infected turns out to be closer to ten and the room, badly lit by flickering flashlight and a faint illumination from the outside, makes you shiver with fear and with sickness and with rage.

You stop and Dina stops behind you, hunched and panicked.

(Fuck, Ellie. Fuck).

The place smells like old blood and old shit and unwashed bodies and piss. It smells like trouble. It smells like hell.

You almost choke on the hot air filling the room and swallow a cough. Somewhere inside the apartment complex, you hear someone shouting a muffled cry of pain or horror (there isn't much difference) and Dina's fingers are digging painfully into the flesh of your shoulder.

"What the – "

"Let's go around." You say in a low whisper and wait for Dina to tap you on your shoulder with two fingers to signal you she heard your suggestion. It's too dark and too quiet to wait for any other response, so you take a deep (silent) breath and start moving, hunched, your muscles burning, your legs shaking like jelly.

There is a clatter somewhere, on another floor. There is another clatter from above. Then there is a voice, a scary little whisper, a scraping sound, and something echoes through the dark dark dark corridor.

"Shit".

"Careful".

(Dina is a warm presence next to you. she's like a lovely glowing fire in a bitter cold, hungry, terrifying world. You cling to her like a helpless baby, clutching her fingers in a death like grip, desperate and drowning and in love).

"Slowly…" you say through gritted teeth as you pick your steps through the crunching garbage that's covering the floor. "Slowly…"

(And a few feet away, just behind the wall on your left, a high wail pierces the darkness).

"Wha – "

(You know this kind of sounds. It's the shrill of pure pain and pure panic and pure horror. You've heard this type of cried before. You had them come out of your own throat more than once).

A shrill of realization.

A shrill of a violent end.

Your body stiffens and a cold sweat breaks all over your body at the sound of it. You clutch your heavy ax with an iron-like grip, pulling it free from where it dangles on a strap of your backpack. Next to you, Dina's muscles tense under her skin, under your touch, when she pulls out her weapon – a rusty heavy pipe she had a cloth wrapped around one hand in a makeshift handle.

"Fuck." You grit your teeth and grab Dina's hand, the one that's on your shoulder. "Fuck".

(Behind you, Dina nods frantically).

"Fuck." She agrees in nothing but a breathy whisper. "Fuck, Ellie".

The cry continues, a heavy cold scream that turns mindless. It's no longer a cry for help, just a wordless shriek and it makes your ears ring and the dark pulse and Dina's fingers dig deep deep deeper into your flesh.

"It's not worth it." You tell her, whispering behind your shoulder to her general direction. "We can look for supplies in other places".

"You read my mind".

"Let's get the fuck outta here".

You hunch your shoulders around your ears, trying to think of a way out. You can't turn back and exit the way you came in. you jumped in through a hole in one of the existing windows, and because you don't have a rope or a cable or a hose, it's a bad idea to try and climb the crumbling walls.

You're looking around, trying to make your panic drenched brain to function. (Dina, you remind yourself. Dina is all that's important right now. You have to get her out of here and you have to focus because Dina Dina Dina).

You're about to suggest something (anything) when a noise interrupts you and from the darkness, you can see six, eight, ten hunched figures starting to move slowly (slowly slowly slowly) at your general direction, growling and moaning and whining in their weird inhuman language.

It's hot inside the dark apartment, but you feel the cold sweat covering your scalp, setting between your shoulder blades, rolling down your sides. You take Dina's hand off of your shoulder and hold her cold fingers in your trembling ones.

"Ellie?" by the way she says your name you know she can't see what you see, either because of the darkness or because you're blocking her view.

"Shh." You say, scared and sharp and hissing, on the verge of tears. "Don't. Make. A sound".

You can hear your and Dina's breaths in the dark, snatched and horrified and trapped, coming sharp and loud and terrified, like hunted animals. Like prey. You fumble with her fingers, draw your ax higher. (You know you could never win if those hunched figures flung themselves at you, but you are ready for a fight. You're ready to do everything to get Dina safe out of this place).

(Your heavy breath is a sharp pain at your side, inside your nose, under your throat).

(The figures move closer closer closer).

The infected haven't noticed you yet, but you know they sense something wrong in the air, something familiar and wanting and fresh.

(Someone is still screaming a floor or two below. Screaming, swearing, growling like an injured animal. But those are not animals sounds. You lived through enough violent history to know human screams).

(A long, high shriek that is starting straining drawing and won't stop).

The ax's wooden grip is slippery in your sweating hand and you feel a sudden urge to pee. Your eyes dart to the shadows around you, your hand is tightening impossibly hard around Dina's hand.

(You want to run and you want to hide and you want to get the fuck out of there, but there is nowhere to run and nowhere to hide and you don't see any exits around you, so you stay planted in one place, breathing heavy and trying to clear your mind enough to figure the next impossible step).

"Ellie," Dina tugs on your hand. "Look." And she's pointing a shaking finger at a hole in the wall. It's small and dark and looks like the last place you want to be in, with a whole fucking hoard of infected around you. It seems like a bad place to get stuck in and you're not sure if you'll fit inside.

"Through there?" you grit your teeth so hard you feel a sharp pain in your jaw. You sound panicked. Hysterical.

(You think of Joel. You picture his calm expression, his sure eyes, his safe nods. You think of him and try to draw comfort from your memories. In your head, Joel is smiling, approving, so alive and so stubborn and so so so real. In your head he says 'yes' in a voice like thunder, pushing you to act. In your head, he points at the hole, just like Dina does, and you're not alone and he is there and he is safe he is safe he is safe).

"Ellie?"

(Please, no. please, no no no).

"Okay". You nod, feeling like anything but nodding. (You feel like screaming and pulling Dina away and you feel like running and like swinging your half-rotten ax. You feel like letting your boiling rage your boiling fear your boiling violence lash out).

(You feel like crying. You feel like hugging. You feel like fucking).

(You are going to have to reserve your panic for later because Dina is looking at you, sinful eyes piercing the darkness, shining and deep and brave, sure mouth whispering "Yeah?" and you nod. "Yeah" because it's the only answer you can give).

(Yeah. Yeah. Yeah).

You make your silent, hesitant way to the small hole in the wall. You can hear the infected, distracted by something, a couple of steps away. (Maybe ten, maybe a hundred). It's hard to tell in the damn pitch-black darkness of this damn pitch-black building.

Your body is tensed and trembling, covered in sweat. You have to let Dina's hand go and you find it hard, the simple act of unclutching your fingers. (You do it anyway).

"C'mon," she says.

You say, "You go first," and you give her a small encouraging push.

She scrumbles to the hole and you turn your back to her, facing the darkness, your ax in waist level, ready to strike.

"Can you fit in there?" You whisper behind your shoulder.

"Yes," Dina's whisper is muffled and strange and you wonder if she's scared of the dark or of small spaces or of dying. Dina is usually so brave and so easy and so light, you sometimes forget she too must be struggling to keep her demons at bay.

"Does it lead outside?" Your eyes are dancing around the room. You see shadows of furniture and shadows of infected (blind, deaf, sick infected) and you wish and wish and wish Dina would hurry up.

"To a fire escape".

"Good enough".

"I'm through. Come on".

You hang your ax on your backpack, press your tongue to the roof of your mouth and wriggle through the hole. You fumble with your backpack, wrestling through, sucking yourself flat.

(Through the hole you see sunlight flashing and flickering, faint and gray, but unmistakable).

You push yourself further. Something cold and wet and frightening soaks through your shirt. You gasp, trying to breathe through the terror, through tittering teeth and a heavy beating heart and the acrid stink of the place. You swing yourself into the gap in the wall, trying not to think of the darkness behind you. You work your hands and your hips and the tips of your toes and the hole is tight (it's tight it's tight it's too tight).

"Motherfucker…"

You get stuck, sneakers digging into stone, cut fingers bleeding and smearing red on the dirty insides of the wall and you know the infected behind you must smell the fresh cut.  
You clench your teeth, squirming.

"Ellie?" You can hear Dina's voice, very close and very very worried. "You good?"

"I'm fucking stuck." You try not to sound so panicked, but you almost sob and you don't care.

"Can you give me your hand? It's not too far. The wall is thin".

You stretch out your stretched arm and you feel hot palms pressing into your wrists. Dina has a good grip on you.

"I'm going to pull," she says it like a warning. "Tell me to stop if I'm hurting you".

You give a growl of approval and she starts pulling. Something sharp rips your shirt through, scraps your shoulder. It's metallic and rusty and mean-looking, but you don't whine and you don't say a word, just push with your toes.

Dina's pull is strong. You are sliding through the wet cold liquid, like a snake. Your shirt gives a mighty ripping sound, again, and your chin is caught against stone or timber or sticking metal. It stings when your flesh cut raw.

"Push," Dina tells you through gritted teeth and you do.

It doesn't take long for you to slide free. Dina pulls and you almost drag her down with your weight over the edge. She manages to keep her balance, and you flop down, face first, from the hole to the shaking fire escape. You fall on your side, legs still tangled inside the hole, and Dina pulls one last time.

Your ears are ringing, eyes shut tight, a stab of panic is still sitting hard in your chest, but you're free.

Dina gives a bubbling laugh. "Fuck. The hell was that?"

"I dunno." You're breathing hard, sweat running down your face, down your waist, down your back. "But it was bad".

You push yourself up, almost sobbing, gurgling, dragging yourself on your hands and knees. You're groggy and weak, and your knees buckle when you stand up. You fall with a thump and Dina surges forward. You put an arm on her shoulder when you stumble up, steadying yourself. You can hardly see and Dina touches a trembling hand to your face, wiping it with gentle fingers, leaving blood on your cheek, and smearing it on your face.

"Did you cut your hand?" you say, a new kind of worry sparks inside of you.

"It's nothing. You ripped your shirt".

You look down, shoulders throbbing, jaw achings, hips grazed raw. Your shirt is a mess but you are going to have to deal with it later. You're happy to be alive.

"It's nothing".

From inside the building, you hear a dragging sound, then a series of gasps and some slow grinding. A distant scream pierces the stormy quiet of the world and you and Dina jump.

"We have to keep moving".

"What the hell is going on in there? Since when the infected act like this?"

You shake your head. "I don't know. But I don't care".

"Nope".

"Let's get the fuck away from here".

Above your heads, the sky is gray and heavy, dark as night. The sun is hiding behind a fat cloud and the beginning of a drizzle starts covering you in annoying splatters.

You are four stories up above street level, only there is no street. Where the street should have been is now a dark, angry, dirty river. It flows dangerously; fast and scary and raging, dark water dragging fragments of cars and wood and things you cannot recognize from where you are standing.

(It looks mean. Deadly).

Your hands are shaking and your vision is blurry. You hate the water, and the new forming river looks like more trouble than the dark apartment swarming with strange behaving infected.

You look up into Dina's dark eyes and through the terror and the panic and the danger, you feel the familiar tingle of want (eternal hot desire) that her face never fails to produce inside of you.

"What do we do now?"

Dina licks her teeth. You see her tongue moving inside her mouth, pressing, sticking through her cheek. She is watching her surroundings with calculating eyes. She lowers her head, searches the waters. She's a good swimmer (you saw her in the lake, back in Jackson) but the river doesn't look suitable for swimming. It doesn't look suitable for crossing in any way if you're being honest.

The water slurps past, purple, and green and black, bobbing with refuse, churning and stinking, and hammering. You can smell it all the way up to where you are leaning against the brick wall. It smells rotten and has a chemical edge that gets caught in your throat.

"That's a bad idea." You tell Dina and point at the water.

"I know. But we can't stay on this fire escape forever".

And she's right. You can hear the infected behind the brick wall. They must have already reached the place you were standing mere moments ago and they no doubt detected the fresh trail of blood you've both left behind. They might be blind and stupid with illness, but they have never failed to trace their prey, once the hunger hits them.

(You have to move. Now).

The sound of the river and the rolling thunder above your heads is enough to drown the screams inside the apartment. Enough to dull the screams and moans and sighs of the infected to a faint noise.

Something is crashing down bellow. There is a roar of metal and a rip, then a shatter of glass. A piece of the old fire-escape stairs fall into the river with a shuddering force. Dina jumps, eyes wide and wet, and you reach for her hand and give her a reassuring squeeze.

"Hey," you say quietly, with a smile you don't feel plastered on your face. "Babe".

Dina peers around, down to the water bellow and up to the roof above your heads. She gives a small whimper of "huh?"

"There." You point at the iron stairs.

Dina creases her brow. "Do you want us to go up there?"

You shrug and squeeze her hand again. "Not really, but it looks like it might be the only way out," and you tug at her hand again, bring her closer to you and place a hot lingering kiss to the corner of her mouth.


	2. We Are Mosaics (Glued Together With Magic And Music And Words)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Dance on broken glass,  
> Build castles with shattered dreams  
> And wear your tears like precious pearls"  
>  — Anita Krizzan

You give a mighty roar as you crash down, your world; a muddy river and an angry dark sky and pain pain pain, is bouncing, all your careful planning flung out the window with your stupid (stupid stupid) decision to jump and you are no longer weary and no longer frustrated and no longer cold. There is pain and wind and the terrible, beautiful now.

(You crash down).

Somewhere above you, Dina is screaming something and

(you think it must be your name).

"Ellie!"

Something is clatching at your ankle, growling and screaming in a raw and deep voice, howling like an animal, jabbing sharp pain into your flesh and you shake your leg you shake your leg you shake your leg, violent and panicked and screeching.

"Get off me! Get the fuck off me!" you snarl and you spit and you swear. You try to knock off the thing that's hanging around your ankle, wrestling and screaming meaningless curses.

You jumped. You jumped, like a motherfucking idiot, leaped from the roof like a madwoman, no time to carefully walk across the carefully laid bridge Dina had so carefully planned, and you crushed to the side of the building, painfully and helplessly and fast, and now you give a long aching groan as you slide, flailing and yelling, trying to get a grasp on something solid before you'll fall into the fast waters bellow you.

(The thought of water – cold, angry, crushing water – Is as scary as the infected that's hanging from your ankle, snapping its jaws, trying to take a bite off your leg, unaware of the danger of certain death beneath him).

"Ellie! Fuck! Oh my god!" Dina is screaming, sharp and urgent, and scared. "Pull yourself up! Fuck! C'mon! I can't reach you from here!"

You thrust your legs, kicking and swearing (and kicking and kicking and kicking). The infected is too busy trying to bite you to hold on tight and his grip on you is a faint one (something that is easy enough to break). You manage to push your foot into his face, kick him twice in the head, and he lets go with an angry scream that rings in your ears long after his body hits the crushing water.

Dina is yelling (your name and something else you can't quite catch, though you can make the several 'fucks!' she groans from time to time). You tighten your hold on the wall you're hanging from, rearranging your aching clumsy fingers, ignoring the wind that's tearing at your shirt, flapping your hair, blinding your sight.

The rain is coming hard, in fat drops that plaster your hair to your forehead. Your vision is dizzy and a little skewed and your head is throbbing. You feel like you can hardly breathe.

"Ellie!"

(The wall is slippery with blood and dirt and rain. Slick and difficult to hang on to).

"Fuck!"

(Your chest is on fire. Every breath you take is a struggle).

"Hang on!"

(You're chocking, swaying, swinging, grasping at the slick stone, every muscle throbbing, your breath a wheezing gasp).

The group of infected on the other roof are barking like dogs, mad and angry and excited, and one of them jumps. He is eager and spitting and screaming but he's too far and he doesn't have the momentum to leap safely across the street, so he falls from the roof, screaming, frustrated more than scared.

"Shit! Ellie! Come on! They're getting closer!" Dina's voice is pure panic. Now that the infected saw you jump, a couple of them try your approach (though all of them end up like the first one, flailing limbs and angry cried and crushing bodies into raging raging raging river).

"Come on!"

You snick a blurred glance behind your shoulder, shadows dancing in the corners of your vision, rain splashing on your head.

"Ellie!"

"Arghh!" You answer and you push yourself up, your chest is a painful spot in the middle of your body and you are having trouble breathing.

"Arghh!" Spit is flying from your bared teeth, the rain falling hard on your face, hammering on your skin and skull, a painful wet rhythm of abuse. You try to drag yourself up but every movement is pure torture. Every strain on your muscles is pain pain pain.

Everything hurts. Your lungs burn and your arms bleed and your ankle is a terrible spasming piece of meat that dangles uselessly under your body, pulling your weight down. Your eyes are tearing up and your throat is sore and your ears are ringing ringing ringing with screams and growls and screeches that you hope none of which are coming from you.

Dina, on the roof, just outside your reach, is getting frustrated with your slow pace.

"Ellie! Come on! Just one push and I'll be able to help you! come on!"

You pull yourself faster, finding footing on the edge of a broken window, and using it to help you drag yourself up. You give a decent push and then there are stretched arms, tanned and dirty and strong and covered in blood, waiting for you to grasp them.

You let out a cry (relief and anger and pain all at once).

The side of the building is thudded into your stomach and the impact drove all the wind out of you. You clutch desperately to what you can find (wet wall, wet roots, wet iron, wet cloth) and you have no strength and no breath and no power left in you to pull yourself up.

(Water and dirt and crumbling plaster are sprinkling into your eyes and you grit your teeth and dig your fingers deep into whatever you're holding onto, whishing for your burning muscles to stop trembling under your skin long enough for you to pull yourself over the edge).

A warm hand clamping around your wrist. "I got you!"

You lift your head, squealing with relief. Dina's face is above you, screwed up in furious frustrated angry effort (her lips are white and her eyes shut tight and she's groaning groaning groaning while pulling you up inch by inch and)

(You're a deadweight of fright and tired limbs and shaken muscles and you're doing very little to help her).

You groan as your injured shoulder stretches, feeling like your arm might rip from its socket. You're gasping and kicking and mumbling something (a wordless violent song of curses and swear words) and Dina gives a mighty grunt and pulls you harder.

(You can hear her mumbling her own encouragement to herself through gritted teeth).

Your flailing foot catches something (Dina groans a relieved 'yes!') and you shove yourself upward and over the edge.

You sprawl on top of her. She falls backward and drags you with her, arms secured tightly around you, and her breath coming in rapid huffs. You grunt something (maybe her name) and let your body sink into her embrace.

"Fuck…"

Both of you are just lying there, you're on top of a breathless Dina, trying to catch your wheezing breaths, soaking wet with sweat and rain, grunting, groaning, moaning with effort, and with pain and with relief (sweet sweet happy relief).

"Motherfucker…"

You can feel Dina's chest rising and falling with every labored breath she's drawing in, hissing something to herself. beneath your ear, her heart is hammering and if you weren't so spent and so frightened and so shaken, you would enjoy the rare intimate closeness of this hug.

You lift your head and look at her, drawing in a hard breath. Dina's eyes are shut and her mouth is pressed into a scared pale line. She seems to be somewhere else, swimming in thoughts that are thousand of miles away from you.

"You okay?" you ask tentatively and she nods but her face is ashen and sweat runs down her temples, into her hair, and you think she must feel something like horror and something like crying and something very similar to what you are feeling right now and (it's everything but okay).

"Mostly".

"Shit. Dina…" you fish for words. "I know it was stupid. I know I shouldn't – "

Then she's kissing you and you can't (you don't even try to) talk.

It's hard and nothing elegant and everything urgent. She's pushing up and you're struggling a little, knocking chins and teeth and noses. You try to twist your head to one side and Dina goes the same way and you catch your head on her brow, teeth scraping, hands gripping, hungry mouths fighting for a better kiss.

You kiss awkward. You kiss urgent. You kiss fierce. It's a neat roughness you haven't experienced so far, and you're kissing like you're running out of time.

Dina pushes forward, almost knocking off of her. You manage to stay in one place, straddling her, and she tears at you, biting biting biting at your bottom lip, sucking and kissing and licking at your mouth.

The rain is pouring stronger now and the infected on the other roof are still trying to cross over to your side, but all you can see feel hear is your breaths, heavy and hot and panting. You snake your hand around Dina's back and she pushes her fingers into your messy hair and you bite down on her tongue.

"Ah!"

You move away, chest heaving. Dina is looking up at you, eyes wide and lips swollen and face flushed.

"Hey," you say gently. "We're okay. It's okay".

"Yeah." She says and pulls you in a hug, falling back to the wet slick roof.

You put your head on her shoulder. Dina is breathing breathing panting and she mumbles something you don't understand. It sounds like some sort of a chant. Like a spell (like a prayer like a poem), and you are fascinated (captivated) by the foreign words.

"Baruch ata Adonai, Eloheinu melech ha-olam, ha-gomel l'chayavim tovot she-g'malani kol tov".

"What?" you ask, not moving.

Dina doesn't answer (you don't ask again).

It's good to have her flushed against you, have her arms pulling you into her chest, (even here, on a wet cold half-collapsed roof with hungry infected swarming around you, in a strange awful hateful city, it's good to have her close, breathing into your ear, lips still stinging from the heated kiss you shared just moments ago).

You close your eyes and let the moment drag out. You know that soon you will have to move, will have to make the distance between you and the infected on the other roof. But for the moment, for a blessed couple of seconds, you just let yourself rest in her arms and breathe in her homey smell.

(Her smell makes you think of bonfires and sunny days at the lake and wooden decks and spilled whiskey. It makes you think of your small place and of guitar strings and snowy paths and)

(You desperately want to kiss her again).

"You feel so good." You murmur into her collarbone and Dina is laughing, her whole body's shaking with laughter and you find that you're laughing too.

"You're high on adrenaline," she says.

"Maybe. But you still feel good".

"You feel good, too." She replies and her voice is intimate, hushed. Her arms are softer now, and something is shifting between you and there is no more urgent needs. (No more scared hammering hearts). You swallow the lump in your throat and try your best to remind yourself just where you are (if you don't, you're afraid you might do something entirely inappropriate).

You lift your head, just a little, and press your mouth to hers. You kiss her because you can and because you're young and because you almost died and you're done denying yourself the simple pleasure of her hot hot hot mouth.

You try to keep it soft and lovely, but Dina kisses you hungrily (more teeth than lips) and you are reminded again of just how badly you want her.

(Your heart is racing and your mind is clouded, your thoughts swimming somewhere far far far away).

The moment ends too soon and Dina breaks the enchanting spell of the aftermath of almost dying by pushing you gently away.

"C'mon." she slaps you affectionately on the back, (dangerously close to your butt), and you groan but get up anyway, pulling her with you.

"Oh," Dina says, more a breath than a word, and gestures at your chest.

It takes you a couple of seconds to realize what she's trying to say, then you lower your head a catch a glimpse of your clothes.

Your shirt is a mess of blood and dirt and it has a nasty tare from your shoulder to your side, exposing your whole body to the cold air. Your jeans are just as messy, torn at the knees but usable. You look up, a little flustered at the exposed skin you're displaying and you notice that Dina's clothes are just as dirty and wet as yours (though her shirt isn't torn to pieces and her jeans are whole).

"Shit." You hiss and give a shiver. you zip up your coat up to your throat, to keep the cold air and the cold rain and the hot hot (dark, lusty) stare away.

"Don't worry," Dina says and her voice is a little thick and a little nervous and a little too excited. "We'll find something else for you to wear".

You nod. The wind blows and hauls like an angry animal. The rain is a constant pour above your heads. From the other roof, the infected are making an unnerving chorus of frustration; moans and whimpers and groans and sobs you think you'll never get used to.

You wince as you stretch your arms high, smoothing your hair. Your shoulder aches as you lift your right hand. You take a deep breath and press your fingers to your ribs, checking for bruises. Everything hurts but nothing is broken, as far as you can tell, and you think it must be your lucky day. Dina raises one eyebrow at you and you shake your head.

"That was one hell of a jump." She says, disbelief and shock and something like pride evident in her voice.

(It was and you're glad you have lived through what you think is one of your stupidest ideas so far). You don't know what to say so you just shrug, pulling your shoulders high around your ears.

Dina is just staring at you. She's dark and solid and shivering, mouth a little swollen from your previous heated kiss. She looks young and sad and tired and a little angry with a touch of sulkiness around her that makes her look even more beautiful than ever.

You work your toes nervously inside your shoes, poking at your sides with stiff fingers, checking for possible injuries you haven't noticed. Dina tames her messy hair with trembling hands, tugs hard at her hair, smoothes her shirt, and shoulders her backpack. Her movements are sharp, precise. All business. When she's ready, she just stands on the roof, a dark figure against the stormy sky.

You take a deep breath. Both of you are dirty and wet and cold and tired. Dina has a gushing wound on her forehead and her nails are cooked with dried blood. There is nothing you want more than to hug her.

"Hey," you say. "You alright?"

"I will be when we get away from them," Dina answers with a twist of her mouth and points to the next roof, where the groups of infected grew into a small hoard. They all stand there, snapping their jaws at you, moaning and sobbing in their sick whiney language.

The smell of shit and dirt and sweat, the smell of rotten bodies and onions and something metallic (the stench of the infected) is standing strong and present in the air (inside your nose). amongst the hunched figured, a huge bloater is roaring, waving its hands and sending toxic clouds into the air. The infected move around him in a haze.

You step closer to Dina, a little hesitant. She's looking at you and you feel a wave of nervousness surge through you. gently, you take her face in your hands. She's very serious and very soft and you kiss her on the lips.

"Let's keep moving".

She smiles. "Where to, now?"

You wince as you work your fingers into your backpack and produce the map you found the other day, just outside of Seattle. It's old and a little torn around the edges, but it's useful and you already added some notes on locations you've visited.

You shield the sogging paper from the drizzling rain and inspect it, Dina a warm presence at your right.

"We haven't been here, yet," you say as you tap a finger to a close location. Dina is looking doubtful (she's looking scared and tired and a little baffled like she can't quite believe you both are still alive). "We can check it out".

"Sounds good. As long as we make some distance between us and them." She points her thumb behind her shoulder and it's a good point.

You scan the roof, shielding your eyes with your hand from the rain. There's a square of grey stone with a heavy door in it on the far side of the roof and you point at it.

"We can try the stairs." You offer.

Dina licks her lips. You don't have much choice, so she nods gravely. You walk across the muddy roof, and through an iron door into the darkened building. The place is gloomy and wet and Dina calls softly at you to watch your step. You wipe your hands on your jeans and produce a gun.

"Hey, babe?"

"Hmm?"

"What did you say, back on the roof?"

You are sliding through open doors, staying close together. This building doesn't smell as bad as the last one and you keep your gun low, pointing it at the floor a step or two before you.

"It's a Jewish gratitude prayer. You say it after completing a dangerous journey." Dina's voice is soft, quiet, and quivering and a little clogged with emotion. Her voice gets this thick when she's talking about her family, about her past before she got to Jackson, and you know just how painful memories can be.

(You want to touch her. You want to let her know you're right there and that she isn't alone, but you remember her sad eyes after she recited the prayer and you keep your hands to yourself).

A waft of heat spills from inside the apartment you're going through. Something deep inside the building is giving a welcoming glow, and there is no signs of life, infected or otherwise.

"You gonna have to say it one more time," you aim at a joking tone but it comes out flat and small. "When we're back in Jackson with fucking Tommy".

As you go deeper, the ramble getting stronger and you think it must be some sort of a machine, working deep inside the walls. It sounds like a huge generator, growling and mechanic, and a little rusty.

(It's hot here, just like in the other building, but after lying on the roof, soaking wet with rain and sweat, you welcome the heat).

You are staring at Dina's back as you walk through the corridors and the staircases. She works her shoulders uncomfortably, the yellow light of the old lamps illuminating her in a dream-like halo.

She makes a small noise, like a sad chuckle and your heart gives a shudder (something like breaking).

"Dina?"

"Yeah?"

"We don't have to talk about it. I'm sorry. It was stupid".

"Not more than usual." She says and a smirk appears on her lips. The smirk grows into a full-blown smile and you shove at her, playfully.

She's smiling, crooked, and happy and shining and a sort of inner warmth spreads inside your chest.

"Shut up." You grumble but it has no force to it, no actual meaning, and Dina knows it.

She takes a deep breath. "It's a good prayer," she says in a more serious tone. "You don't usually say it like that. You're supposed to say it in front of a congregation, a prayer quorum, in a synagogue. But," she shrugs uncomfortably. "Well… you know".

"What do the words mean?"

"It means to say how grateful we are for God's reward of goodness".

You take her hand and put your fingers through her. "I like it." You say and you don't try to kiss her.

"Me too." She answers and leans forward and catches your lip between hers.


	3. Let Your Heart Crumble Into Tiny Precious Seeds (Then Plant Love Everywhere You Go)

You slide the door open, muscles burning (burning burning) with effort, sweat dripping down your face, tickling your skin.

Light is flooding into the room and you are frozen. Dina, still a little sad and a little unsteady and very very tired, is standing next to you, blinking and looking like a deer caught in the headlights.

Something big (something huge something monstrous), makes an unmistakable noise, like thunder coming out of a sore throat and a primal dread is freezing your blood in your veins. Your whole body goes stiff.

(You are tired and you are scared and you are lost so lost so lost).

You pant and you gasp and you breathe hot air into your raw throat, but you can't get enough air and you feel like choking. Your hands are trembling and the handle of your ax is slippery in your weak fingers. Your knees are shaking, buckling, too weak to carry your own weight and a single tear (of exhaustion and of fear and of anger) rolls down your cheek.

(You grip Dina's hand gets harder harder harder, till you're squeezing her cold fingers with unimaginable strength, making her slightly squeal at the force of your grip).

Blood is running down your face from a former cut that you can't remember how you got. (Blood is running down your chest from a cut you remember all too well how you got). Red streaks down your right hand and your fingers are clumsy and sticky and trembling. You're smearing blood on Dina's hand and on the wooden handle of your ax, like some kind of an unholy offering to bloodthirsty ancient god and

(You don't believe in gods).

Another roar erupts the crumbling walls of the old building and you curl back your lips, baring your teeth like an animal. You clench your fists. You squeeze Dina's fingers in yours and you bite so hard, teeth grinding against teeth, that pain shoots through your jaw right to your nose and eyeballs, so much pain you're afraid you might have cracked something.

(You catch a glimpse of Dina's face and she is stricken, pale and scared and staring, chewing on her bottom lip).

Then the creature makes another sound and you have never heard anything like it before.

The floor under your feet is shaking, moving, vibrating, and you wonder briefly what will happen if the whole damn thing will come tumbling down.

(Will you be buried under hundred tones of stone and concrete? Will you die fast? Will you be fast enough to push Dina out of harm's way?)

It takes everything you have to stay upright. You're numb and weak and heavy and your hands and legs and lungs hurt they hurt they hurt.

The building is wobbling like jelly, all dark walls, and bright pink light and a swimming mess of garbage and splinters and old open cans with sharp sharp edges.

Your heart is thudding in your chest but you can hardly hear it above the roar of the monster on the other side of the wall. Your breath is caught in your throat and you clutch Dina's hand like it's something important.

"Ellie. Come on. We have to get the fuck out of here." Dina's voice is low, full of panic and emergency and

(You can't make yourself move).

"Ellie?" Dina tugs lightly on your hand, the one's cupping her palm. She's moaning, gasping, gripping your fingers. The roars are loud and scary and she shakes your hand.

"Hmm?" You can't take your eyes off the wall. You can't talk. You can't move.

"We have to turn back".

"Hmm".

"I mean, right now," her eyes are bulging and her voice is a strange, shrieking whisper. "Now. Before this thing decides we'll make a fine dinner".

"Hmm".

"Are you hurt?"

"No".

"Can you move?"

"Yeah".

"Then fucking move! Please!"

You're about to answer. You're about to turn around and make your steady exit, with Dina's hand tugging meaningful tugs at your clammy one when another one of the thundering roars booms through the halls of the building and you let out a frightened "Motherfucker!" just as Dina gives a high, loud, wordless shriek.

The thing on the other side of the door is round and slow and looks like a monster from the darkest, scariest fairytales. It has more than three heads which grow fungus above open, screaming mouths. It has something that looks like pockets full of neon-colored liquid all over its body, and dozens of arms and legs and teeth and it moves towards you.

"What – " you say and Dina cuts you with a shrill that shoots to your aching head.

"The fuck is that!"

The huge monster makes a sound, deep and scary from within its numerous throats, like something from the deep ocean (like something from the outer space).

(Like something from hell).

Your ears are ringing and your skin is cold with sweat. The pain grips your limbs burns them through. The taste is fierce and salty and metallic in your mouth. Your world is danger and fear and Dina's cold cold fingers, clutched securely in yours.

There is a clicking sound about the monster in front of you. a clicking sound, and a flattering. Something thuds in the distance make your heart jump and your stomach drops and you are already running.

It's dark and you can barely see anything, but you see enough. The pulse is so loud behind your ears it drowns almost everything else out.

You catch Dina's arm and drag her into the next room, legs clumsy and shaking. You run and fall and slide between the forgotten furniture, between tables and couches and counters, as you slip and cough and run and run and run.

The air in your nose is uncomfortable. Bad. Your eyes are filled with horrified tears and you're panting. Your feet against the concrete floor are loud and Dina is breathing heavy on your neck. She's screaming something, but her voice is disturbed by the effort of her breathing and you're not paying attention, because you're too focused on running.

Something metallic scattering across the floors behind you when you fly through rooms, a clashing and clanging and crashing and booming.

Heat shoots through your veins, and the violent hatred nearly chocking you.

Dina's foot slips and she goes tumbling on the floor. A high shrill pierces your ears and pulses in your head. The sound scraps at your throat and you realize it's you who's screaming.

"Dina!"

You help her up, tripping on her outstretched legs, nearly falling yourself. You pull her, nothing fancy or pretty, just a quick jerk, and you're running again.

Ahead there is a feeble stream of light, coming from a broken window. Shining at the end of the hall. It's not a flat wall or a locked door. It's a dead-end you were scared to find an elevator shaft. It's abandoned and deep and condemned, like the building and like the city and like the monster behind you.

"Stop stop stopstopstop!" Dina is scrambling to a halt, pulling you away. Her voice is desperate. She's clutching your hand, her fingers dig into your arm, under your armpit, strong and painful and full of intention.

"We're not jumping!"

Your breaths are hissing and wheezing as you turn a corner, slapping doors behind you, your footsteps echoing from the walls. You and Dina run, hand in hand, not letting go. You burst through doors into dark staircases, you drop chairs and tables behind you like it will slow down the monster chasing you. You close doors, you move shelves, you jump through broken windows separating rooms.

(You run and run and run).

The monster is roaring behind you, puffing something toxic into the air, shaking the floor with its legs, like an earthquake of one.

Anger and fear flash through you as you run, hot and wild. You gasp, blood pulses through your neck, pounding in your ears, tightening your fists and heating your cheeks.

"Run!" Dina yells. "Run! This way!"

You gasp when something catches your head. Dina grabs you by the elbow and swings you into the next room. You descending through the stairs, jumping, closing doors behind you, knowing full well nothing will hold the multiheaded, evolved infected away.

You leap through open doors, trying not to leave a path the monster can follow. You're not sure what the thing can understand, but it sure can see paths of destruction. It sure can recognize the tittered furniture and the broken glass.

(It sure can smell your panic, your terror, your complete desperation to get away).

"Fuck!" you scream. "Fuck!"

You are dragged by Dina, now. There are lights ahead, faint and distant, but they are there. You are running through a huge hall, covered with tall grass. The doors are closed and locked on a huge chain, but someone broke the windows to the left, and you flung through them, panting and coughing and choking.

"Don't stop! Run! Run! Run!" Dina is hissing at you. There are no more sad smiles and no more soft words and no more gentle hands. She has a vise grip on your wrist and her fingers dig painfully into your skin and she's pushing her legs harder, her breathing is a heavy, low grunting thing.

"Fuck!" your blood is boiling in your veins, hot.

"Fuck!" your chest is heaving, painfully.

"Fuck!" your hands are shaking, badly.

You stumble behind Dina, the wailing of the monster behind you, just outside of reach but close enough to keep you running. Keep you pushing. Keep you stumbling and screeching and fleeing.

And you are fleeing. Your legs tremble with great effort, slapping against the floor in an angry rhythm. Your thoughts are wild and scared and angry and you stumble. Cold wetness cover your forehead, the hollow sound is ringing in your ears. Nausea and fear are making you dizzy. Clumsy. Everything that is not safe and focused and running.

"Come on! Come on!" Dina is gritting her teeth, pulling you faster. She doesn't seem tired. She looks so fierce and so determined and so strong you're afraid she might keep on going forever.

"Right behind you!" you gasp, panic and sickness stealing the volume from your rasping voice.

Dina is running like the wind, fast and unapologetic. You duck down a corner, slid in filth, going over in piles of dirt and garbage and stinking water. You scramble up again, Dina's hand never leaving yours.

You plunge past rooms, through a rammed corridor, and on and on and on. You flung yourself desperately in any direction, at doors you know are locked (they are locked locked locked!). You run through rooms with sagging ceilings and dissolving rugs. You run drunk. You run scared.

(You run for your life).

The stench is horrible, toxic, and sharp and you are coughing, choking on the smell of the infected and the clouds of poison the monster behind you is spreading.

"We have to find a way to get the hell out of here!"

"An open window!"

And then, together, you say: "The street!"

You jump and fall. There are holes in the floor, there are broken tiles and flies crawling and buzzing in every corner. There are old corpses who don't look human any longer, just bones and rags and grinning mean skulls. There are pools of dried blood, of dried piss, of dried puke.

The creature is bringing down walls, smashing into them because it cannot fit in door frames. The building is shaking and you scream and scream and scream as dust and small stones and pieces of concrete and rotten iron come falling on your head.

"For fuck's sake! Out! Out! Out!"

Your hands are bleeding. Dina's fingers are stained red, and you feel your grip on her slacken. You clutch her harder, afraid to let go. She has a strong grip on your hand as well, and you're flying, legs kicking the floor, wind smacks your faces.

Then she kicks down a rotten door that has wooden boards nailed to it, and you are almost stumbling together to a rainy street.

The screams and shouts and wails and screeches are still behind you and you don't stop your mad fleeting even as you burst into the open air. Your slapping feet are echoing through the street as you keep running you keep running you keep running.

You run, together, not letting go. Dina's fingers are folded around your wrist in an iron grip that will probably leave a nasty mark on your skin. You run and every muscle in your body is aching. Your lungs are on fire. your throat is clogged.

You don't look back, but you imagine the huge murky figure, the monster made of smaller monsters, somewhere behind you.

Your shoes are making angry sounds against the cobbles. You turn, you run, your breath crawling in your throat. You turn a corner and fly through small bushes. When you are turning another corner, into a different street, and the roars and moans of the creature has drowned somewhere behind you, far (if not exactly far enough) you make your legs stop, slowly slowly coming to a halt.

Dina is breathing heavy heavy breaths by your side. She is bent over, hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath, making gagging sounds you can't say you don't understand because your own lungs feel like spilling from your throat.

You are endlessly cold. Endlessly hungry. Endlessly scared. Dina's presence is the only thing keeping you on your feet and you feel like crying. The constant nagging ache of fear is very very sharp at the back of your head and you're not sure if you made enough distance to be safe from whatever it was you managed to awake in that apartment complex.

(You feel like crying but you don't cry. You can't afford yourself the privilege. First, you need to make sure both of you will stay alive long enough to feel sorry for yourselves. Then you'll cry).

You take a deep breath.

"Alive?" you check with Dina. You are sitting on your toes, arms dangling over your knees.

Your heartbeat is thud thud thudding in your ears. Your fingers are hooking, playing, twitching. Dina is watching you, silent and careful, under her furrowed brows and you feel like if she doesn't answer soon, you will spring out and run.

(She doesn't say anything, just keeps on looking at you like you are someone she doesn't know, or like you might turn into something dangerous).

(You hate this look in her eyes).

"Dina?" you aim for soft but you're too breathless and you sound impatient.

"Alive." She says, and her voice is raw and strange and nothing like her usual lovely low voice you love so much.

You try not to focus on her tone. "Nothing's broken?"

Dina pats herself, first arms, then chest, then legs. You do the same, poke and pat and tap and pinch, looking for injuries you might have missed in your haste to get out of the building alive.

"Everything seems fine. How about you?"

"Same?"

Dina steps close. She's hesitant but the look in her eyes makes you shudder. (Strong, you think. So strong. You don't think you know someone stronger than Dina and the usual urge to kiss her rises in you).

"Now," she says and she's growling, low and dirty and very very hot, in your ear. "Let's get the fuck out of here".

Your skin burns where it meets Dina's and her hand in your bloody one is better than good. Your chest aches with something warm and something scary and something that feels like home.

The blood is pumping in your veins for all kinds of different reasons. Your stomach flatters. Your heart punches against your ribs, just like pain (just like pleasure).

"What?" Dina asks, her eyes are searching yours (her eyes are always searching yours and if she wasn't her, you'd think she's looking for signs you don't actually want her. But she's Dina. She's this confident, happy, strong woman and you find it hard to believe she isn't sure about your loud loud loud feelings).

Your heart throbs when you meet her dark beautiful eyes. You can feel her hot breath on your cheek and suddenly, you don't know what you wanted to say. You don't know if you can and you shake your head, face burning bright red.

"Ellie?" her voice is different now. Slow and intimate

You take her hand, scared this time like you haven't just held hands while running for your lives.

(It feels different now. Good but scary).

When you touch her, you feel like flames are flowing from her fingertips and penetrate your sensitive skin. Her fingers tighten around your palm.

"What is it?" she's a little scared too. You feel the shift in the air. Dina tries to catch your eyes but you refuse to look at her.

"I dunno. I just…"

"Oh, Ellie – " she sighs in your ear and pulls your face to hers.

There are flames in her palms and in her lips and on her tongue. She kisses you fierce and blistering and you've kissed before but somehow it feels special now. More special than usual.

Dina's hands are in your hair and your heart is thudding so painfully against your chest you're afraid it's about to combust. You can't breathe but you don't want to and you angle your head and kiss her back.

"Dina," you breath and try to pull away, or deepen the kiss (you're not sure) and she pulls away and looks at you with something like fear and something like horror and something like realization (like love).

Dina's hands paint your cheeks with fire. she strokes her thumb against your face, smoothly and slowly and lovingly and it leaves burning paths on your burning flesh.

You're searching her face and for a second, anger flashes through her beautiful bold features and it makes her look dangerous. More dangerous than you've ever seen her before. You never thought Dina could look this scary. This wild.

An abrupt panic, like a warning premonition, makes your lower lip quiver.

"I…" you start but Dina doesn't let you finish. The flash of anger is gone and she looks like herself again, a confident crease arching her dark brows, a smile tugging at the corner of her lips.

She laughs a warm laugh like you haven't almost got killed by a scary scary scary thing that once was an infected and now is a huge monster that doesn't make any sense.

She leans forward and presses her mouth to yours.

"Let's not think about anything right now, okay?" she says softly and you find yourself nodding, a little disappointed and a little relieved.


	4. The Ruins Of Your Soul (Are Poetry To Me)

You hear the river even as you move away from it, a scary roar that becomes a whisper through the stone and iron building of this foul (empty stinky) city.

Dina is sending hesitant glances behind her shoulder every couple of minutes, chewing on her bottom lip, and you can't blame her. Between the infected monster and the armed WLF soldiers, the angry waters, and the wide river, it's a miracle you both are still alive.

You are sweat-soaked and rain-soaked and river-soaked. You are thirsty and hungry and there is a constant stab of fear in the back of your mind (between your shoulder blade. On your scalp). You don't remember the last time you weren't so damn scared (scared of death and of steal and of bullets).

(If you were ever happy and at ease, you can't remember the feeling).

"Keep going. Keep going. Keep going." You hear Dina sing-songs to herself, teeth clenched and fists squeezed and you feel like shit because you can't keep her safe (you wish you could).

"Watch out for runners. They have a knack for hiding in plain sight".

"Hmm." Is Dina's chocked replay and you take her hand and give it a weak squeeze.

(You are so damn scared).

You feel like you were always scared, since the day you were born. Scared your entire life. You were scared of cold and scared of hunger and scared of exhaustion and scared of jail. You were scared of being alone, of being hurt, of being crippled. You were scared of sharp pain, you were scared of dogs' teeth and of dark uniforms and of badly painted graffiti on the streets of Boston's QZ.

Now, what you're feeling is a crueler sort of fear. The fear for another's life. It isn't the hot fear of death, but the cold, knowing, sharp fear of losing Dina (like you lost Joel and like you lost Tesse and like you lost Riley).

You are struggling through the streets (dark, empty, unfamiliar streets). The map is of little help and every muscle in your body is aflame, hurting, and nagging and making your journey harder. Your toes are icy cold inside your sneakers, you can barely feel your fingers and every step is a special kind of torture made just for you.

You walk stubbornly fast, keep your pace steady. You walk throughout the whole day and it's hard to stop even when the cold sun is setting behind the huge buildings that block the view from every corner and the darkness swallows the horizon.

You can hardly see your hands stretched before you in the dark. Dina is a warm presence at your side and when you light your flashlight, for a couple of moments, just to make sure you aren't about to fall to your death, you can see the side of her face illuminated by the gloomy faint light of the moon.

"We have to get some sleep," Dina says in her special kind of voice, sure and motherly and knowing, all calm and reassuring like nothing has the power to faze her.

"In an hour." You say and want nothing more than to fall on the ground and sleep and sleep and sleep.

It's a big city and you circle and circle and circle it for the next two hours. Despite your promise and Dina's gentle ushering, neither of you is willing to stop. You fall into hollow rocks and stumble on small craters and get lost in vast streets, only half-knowing where the hell you're headed to, wishing and wishing and wishing Tommy was closer.

When you finally stop, you fall into an ugly mockery of sleep and get shaken awake what feels like moments later, bruised and aching and hungry. Dina is looking at you with sad sorry wet eyes and you try for a pitiful smile (for her sake) and kiss her gently on the lips.

"How are you doing?"

"I'm okay." You tell her in a whispered lie and she nods and kisses you back.

The next day is much like the first. There is the constant clicking and moaning of runners, just behind the corner, in the gloomy grey glimmer of the sun. There is pain and there is hunger and there are more infected than you care for.

(You try your best to avoid them but you end up killing a couple anyway).

(Dina's hands are smeared with blood and yellow liquids and the city stretches on and on and on, rocks and garbage between your dragging feet).

By midnight, your stomach growls so loud, you turn around to look for infected. Dina doesn’t laugh. She shrugs off her backpack and produces two bottles of water and a sandwich that back at Jackson you would have never considered touching, but now looks like the food of kings. You both wolf down your late dinner and sigh and sigh and sigh with relief.

"Where to, now?" Dina rolls her wounded shoulder (aching and sore from your previous violent meeting with the infected), working her fingers into her skin, digging into her flesh to relieve the tension building in her muscles. You put your hand on her and massage her flesh with strong fingers, trying not to let her warmth and closeness to distract you.

You suck sour sauce from your free hand's fingers, leftovers of the small sandwich you shared, and check your map, balancing it on your palm, fingers spread, not willing to let go of Dina's arm just yet.

"Hmm… this way," you point with your chin to the corner of the map and Dina taps the paper, and you nod. "Yeah. There".

"How long?" She asks in a distracted sort of way. You look at her. She's busy with calculating the rout and with working the pain from her shoulder (too busy to notice your curious stare) and you find that you like her distracted look (wide eyes and pressed lips and frowning brows).

(You ache and ache and ache to smooth the line that's forming on her forehead. You ache to touch her face. You ache to kiss and kiss and kiss her, and you do nothing, just stand and stare at her.)

"Two hours? If we're lucky".

"Are we? Lucky?"

You shrug. "I don't believe in luck".

She smiles then, and because you're nineteen and you're young and you're (almost) free (because you're in love you're in love you're in love) you lean in and kiss her.

Dina makes a surprised sound at the back of her throat but kisses you back anyway.

Her kiss is all fire, reckless and burning and demanding. Her arms sneak behind your back and she pulls your close to her, your bodies pressed tightly together, fitting like two pieces of a familiar puzzle.

When you step back, breathless, and with an aching jaw, you open your mouth (to say something, or maybe to kiss Dina again) but you are cut short. First, there is the sound of breathing, heavy sort of breathing (animals running), and then barking dogs rip through the darkness and you almost fall over your own stumbling feet.

You grab Dina by the hand and drag her back, into a dirty corner of some bad-smelling building.

Dina's mouth is hung open and her eyes are huge (your own eyes are bulging and your teeth clutched). You both are sneaking frightened glances behind the crumbling wall, watching as dogs (ten, at the very least) spill from a narrow alley across the empty street.

"Fuck!" Dina hisses and you can do little but agree.

"Fuck".

The dogs are huge and mean-looking, with foam around their mouths and sharp claws and wet teeth. They are snarling and barking and drooling, bouncing on short leashes, almost reaping the leather strings their collars are attached to.

At first, the sight frightens you and you make a strangled sort of noise at the back of your throat (dogs are a bad sign). Then come the men and you realize you would have preferred fighting a pack of angry dogs than this small army of WLFs.

From where you and Dina are hiding, you can's see how many soldiers there are, but you can see they are a greater number than the dogs they have on leashes. You think they must be about twenty or thirty men. They look like a small army, with high boots and dark uniforms and huge riffles and bows and guns.

They arrange and rearrange, check their weapons. Then, they kneel, produce different kinds of guns from different kinds of straps, and start shooting in your general direction.  
You let out a surprised (scared scared) cry and hug Dina tight. You smash her into the wall, shielding her from stray bullets with your own body.

"Get down and cover your head!" You're almost shouting in her face, then shrug off your bow. You crouch, fascinated, eyes fixed on the dogs and the men. You count ten arrows, lay them beside your foot, the one that's planted into the ground, and sort them so it's easy for you to reach them fast.

(It's not enough but it will have to do, so you dig your knee deeper into the garbage covering the ground, level your bow, and once there's a lull in their attack, you start shooting).

It looks like it takes the dark figures across the street forever to fall. You aim for their heads, for the middle of their chests. The string makes a gentle, strangled whisper when you let the arrows fly and you make sure the soldiers are dead when they hit the ground.

(You can hear the quick clicks when the arrows find their targets, you can hear the strangled, surprised grunts when the soldiers are falling, and when, moments later, they renew their shooting, you count fewer bullets).

"What the fuck are they doing?" Dina's screaming, forearms covering her ears, crouched in the corner.

"And where the fuck are they coming from?" you mumble, eyes searching searching searching.

(You know this is bad. The noise is unbelievable and you think back to the runners you and Dina's been avoiding for the better part of the morning. Infected known for traveling and your forehead is clammy with cold sweat when you think of the hoard you pass not more than a few hours ago).

"Dina," you whisper, trying to think of something important (something smart) to say, but it's too late.

Figures emerge from the nearby buildings, things that once were human beings. Runners. Wild and shadowy, glimpses of scrunched faces, bared teeth, drooling mouths. They don't carry any weapons and their clothes are torn, like old tired beggers, but they are hungry and they are trouble and they are more than capable of taking the WLFs down.

The infected are running (crunched and stumbling and limping), from all over the street. They're jaws hang low and their and teeth are shining and the WLF soldiers let out shrieks of panic and fear that you almost enjoy.

The infected scatter all around the street, screeching and gibbering, weeping, wailing, moaning their mad moans, like beasts. Like devils.

The first runners are dropping fast, but there are more, much more, and they gurgling, hit by bullets, stumbling and falling and running over their dead fellow infected, swarming over the group of slow (scared, terrified) soldiers.

Your urge to run rockets sky high when you see the runners launch at the soldiers' necks, biting biting biting, and you grab Dina by the shirt, at her shoulder, and shake her to her feet. Your breath is coming as a heavy, wheezing thing, and Dina whimpers when you start shoving her back.

"We have to run." You say with gritted teeth and Dina is nodding, frantically nodding nodding nodding.

"There!" she croaks. "Up!" and she points at a fire-escape ladder that's dangling just outside your reach.

You don't have time to think about it. From the street, you hear the mad sound of battle. Guns and riffles are going off, cutting infected in their heads and chests and bellies (not fast enough to stop their mad attack). The soldiers are screaming at each other, screaming at the infected. The dogs are barking barking barking, a horrible sound that seems to work wonders on your sensitive nerves.

"Come on! You go first!" Your throat is sore and you stretch your arm above your head, catch the ladder and give a mighty yank. The old rusty thing makes a screeching sound that can be easily heard over the mad noise of shooting and roaring, and you plant your feet on the ground and grunt when Dina uses your shoulder to boost herself on the rotten thing.

A shower of dust and rust of years shower you from above when Dina secures the ladder and swings herself up, smooth movements and dangling feet.

"Come on, Ellie. Give me your hand".

You turn your head to see if you can safely make your jump, and catch a figure dropping from a near building, just a few feet away. You glance up at Dina, to make sure she is up on the old fire escape, away from any immediate danger, and a surge of panic and relief mixes in your chest.

The soldier is no more than a boy, you think he must be around your age. He has a grin on his face and a huge knife in one hand and there is a pricking sensation between your shoulder blades, like you know it's about to get violent.

Sweat springing from your forehead.

"Fuck." You whisper.

Above you, on the dangling fire escape, Dina gives a roaring cry, to warn you or to let her frustrations known (you can't tell which one).

"Ellie!"

"No!" you scream at her, your eyes fixed on the blond teenager with the ill-fitted uniform. "Don't go down here. Stay where you are!"

"Ellie – "

"No!"

You see the boy's eyes drawn up, to where Dina is standing on the fire escape. He smiles a wicked kind of smile and leaps forward, not giving you an opportunity to circle him. You snarl and snap when he makes contact, and jerk yourself backward, out of his arm's reach. You catch your foot on a hidden rock and fall on the ground with a painful grunt.  
The boy leaps forward and trips on the same rock you did. He goes down in a screech, falling on top of you.

(On the fire escape, Dina is still screaming. From the corner of your eye, you see her fumbling with her gun and you hope and hope and hope that when she takes the shot, she doesn't miss).

(She doesn't shoot).

You are struggling to get the heavy boy off of you. his arms are flailing, his fist punches you in the shoulder and then in your side. You grunt (his punches are wild and he doesn't aim well) and slip your hands under his arms, pinning him.

He spits and struggles to get free, but you are strong enough to keep him secured.

"Bitch!" He almost laughs.

"Mother… fucker!" You answer through clenched teeth.

You are rolling on the ground, trying to maintain your control over him. He still has his knife in one meaty feast and he makes mighty attempts to stab you, snarling and breathing heavy in your face.

"Die, you bitch!"

You strain and grunt, trembling with the effort to both keep him away and hold him close. He is stronger and you twist away when the blade catches your hand and leaves a burning cut on your skin.

"Ah!"

"Ellie!"

You try to reach to your own weapon, but your backpack is trapped underneath you and your palms are sweaty. The switchblade is digging painfully into your butt. There is no way you could pull it free, so instead, you try to pin the teenage soldier. He drools and snorts and spits, whimpering, calling you names. You make similar sounds and you grunt similar words and you spit similar swears at him.

(You don't care what you sound like as long as you can keep him from stabbing you in the stomach with his nasty looking knife).

He manages to twist free of your embrace, roll twice, and you punch and punch and punch his face, your knuckles are sore and slick with his blood.

"Arghh!"

He tores his arm free of your clawing fingers and his elbow catches you in the nose.

There is a sick crunching sound and your world is white white white pain. Your head snaps back and you cut your skull on some sharp stone.

(Your ears are ringing).

"Motherfucker!"

(From far away, Dina is screaming your name. it's a pained scream. A scream of horror and frustration).

You try to shake the pain and dizziness away, try to roll over from underneath his heavy body, but he is strong and his head is clear and he still has his nasty knife clutched tightly in one hand.

"I'll kill you!" He snarls at you, all snapping jaws and spitting words. "I'll kill you, you bitch!" and he makes a swift motion and cuts your face just below the left eye. it's a shallow cut but it hurts like a bitch and you wail and cry and choke.

"Fuck!" you scream and somewhere above you, you hear Dina screaming her own wordless scream.

"I will fucking kill you, bitch! I will fucking – "

Something blows in your face, sprays your cheek, dark and hot and salty, and the press of the knife is gone. Your mouth is coppery and hot with blood and you choke on it and spit it and cough it out as the WLF asshole gurgles blood.

"Wha – "

You push him hard, both hands on his chest. The boy totters back. He lifts a trembling hand to his neck, and when he finds nothing there, he searches for a way to get to the back of his shoulder, trying to reach behind himself. Blood is running down his chin and from his nostrils and you don't have to see the shot wound in his back to know Dina caught him between the shoulder blades.

You push him off of you.

"Ellie!"

You scramble to your feet, a little disoriented and a little dizzy, swaying. You press your hand to your head and check for blood. Your fingers are red and cooked with dried blood, but it's old and dark on your palm and you press your hand again and again and again to the back of your head, just to be sure.

"Ellie! Fuck! Come on!" Dina is lying flat on her stomach. She managed to lower the ladder more and now you make your dizzy, clumsy way up.

She grabs your hand once you're high enough, then pulls you up and when you're safe and secure, lying on your side next to her, she pushes her boots into the rotten ladder and gives a mighty push. It takes a couple of seconds for the rusty nails to give up and the old thing topples over to the ground.

"Good job." You murmur, face pressed to the cold dirty iron of the old fire-escape.

When she turns to you, her face is blank and she just stares.

"What?" you mumble, your heart beating a fast staccato against your chest.

"Dina. What?"

She still doesn't answer. Instead, she walks to where you are lying, slowly, not smiling and not frowning and not crying, pulls you up in one strong motion, and backs you to the brick wall. She stands close, the toes of her boots pushing at you sneakers with incredible force.

She is so beautiful it hurts you and your eyes sting with unspilled tears (because you almost died you almost died you almost died). Every nerve in your body is aflame, burning with fear and with want and with desire.

Every muscle under your skin is twitching.

Every piece of you is trembling and shaking and weak.

"Ellie," Dina whispers your name like a prayer. Like she can't quite believe you're real. "Ellie".

And then, before you can answer and before you can lean down and kiss her, she folds you in her arms.

"Oh, my God." She moans and she holds you tight so tight so tight it's almost painful and her tears wet your shoulder.

"Hey," you say and hug her back. "Hey. Are you crying?"

She shakes her head and her sobs shake both of you.

It takes some time for her to let you go and when she does, she holds your head between her hands and look nothing like happy and everything like angry and

(You think you understand her anger).

"Don't ever fucking do that again," she says, face stained with tears and with smears of blood from where she pressed her cheek to the side of your head.

You smooth her hair and kiss her on the mouth, just a small peck because you can't resist it.

"I promise." You croak, voice trembling and you hope and you and hope it's not a promise you will have to break any time soon.

(You both know it's a lie and you both know it's not a good lie and you both know it's not a good promise you can keep, but Dina hugs you tighter and buries her nose in your neck and you let her stand there, for another moment).

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading.  
> Also, come visit me @ love-jesus-but-i-drink-a-little.tumblr.com


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